Will Smith says Saints players never should have been punished

New Orleans Saints defensive lineman Will Smith joined the show to share his opinion on Paul Tagliabue’s ruling that vacated penalties on him and three other former and current Saints players and look back at the whole BountyGate scandal.

“We felt all along we should have never been punished,” Smith said, “because what we were accused of doing never actually took place. …. There still were no findings we had a ‘pay to injure’ scheme. The findings were that we ahd a ‘pay for performance’ scheme.”

Dan asked Smith what players were paid for. “You’re paid for positive plays and it wasn’t a lot of money in the grand scheme of things,” Smith said.

Smith said most of the guys didn’t take the money and they had an event at the end of the year with the money.

Smith said the coaches knew and that Gregg Williams brought it to the team. He said he didn’t know if Sean Payton knew. He said he’s run into Payton a couple of times, but all he could say was hi and bye.

Smith said it was never done to injure anyone. It was always a positive thing.

Smith said as upset as he is with Roger Goodell, he and the Saints players still respect the commissioner.